CAN THIS TRANSMISSION REALLY DOUBLE YOUR CAR'S MILEAGE?

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ERDA then contacted the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, California and asked it to investigate the performance of the IST. Carman, however, refused to take one of his cars to California. ERDA next got in touch with a test lab in Portland (Mr. Black implied that it was the only facility in the area with the capability of handling such work) ... but, due to some internal problems, that particular facility won't be able to evaluate the Inertial Storage Transmission for another 15 to 18 months.

Mr. Black also stated that he had heard via the grapevine that the hydraulics shop which did much of the work on Carman's current prototype has a $20,000 lien on the automobile and refuses to let it leave the Portland area. ERDA feels that this may be one of the reasons for Vince's inflexibility about the location in which his prototype is demonstrated to the agency. ERDA, according to Black, has even checked with its lawyers to learn if there is any legal way it can pay off the lien against the IST prototype so the auto can be moved to California and tested. "No," the lawyers have decided, "there's no legal way that public money can be used to pay off Mr. Carman's private debt."

Mr. Black further noted that ERDA gets a letter almost every day from Mr. Carman ... and that the agency has trouble just keeping up its end of the correspondence. According to Jerry Black, though, ERDA does feel that the Inertial Storage Transmission is technically credible and the agency believes that Carman's demonstrations are honest. Mr. Black says he is confident that, sooner or later, the JPL tests will confirm this and that, sometime in the future, the Postal Service will get its fleet of IST-equipped vehicles.

VINCE CARMAN'S RESPONSE TO ERDA'S PROPOSAL FOR A CALIFORNIA TEST OF HIS TRANSMISSION

After visiting Mr. Carman in Portland, seeing his current prototype, preparing the main body of this article, and talking by phone to ERDA's Mr. Black ... MOTHER's Travis Brock called Vince and questioned him further about the Energy Research and Development Administration's proposed Pasadena test of his transmission.

Carman replied that the Jet Propulsion Lab (which ERDA wants to evaluate his unit) has been doing work on a flywheel system (the idea that is directly competitive with his energy storage system) and he doesn't trust the people at JPL to give his transmission a fair shake. And that's the reason, he says, that he insists the ERDA demonstration must take place in Portland.

Vince also mentioned that he's now selling stock (the second issue) in an effort to raise $200,000 which he needs for further development of the IST ... and for testing the system in some transit buses!

Mr. Carman says the stock is selling well and that he "expects this thing to break wide open" once he gets his ISTequipped diesel Volkswagen Rabbit on the road. When asked what he means by "break wide open", Vince said that "once people see this thing being driven all over the U.S., they'll raise such a ruckus demanding cars with IST transmissions—which will only add $200 to $300 to the cost of a new car—that both ERDA and Detroit will be forced to give the system serious consideration."

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